As computers and computer networks become more pervasive in the home and workplace, many established methods for performing everyday tasks are being replaced or streamlined through the use of computer networking technology. For example, employees are increasingly able to have a virtual presence in their workplace by logging into a computer network maintained by their employer. Perhaps the most striking development in computer networking technology today has been the advent of remote collaboration.
One of the oldest forms of processing data is the meeting or conference, whereby multiple individuals focus their attention on common subject matter to arrive at a joint decision, consensus, or product. Increasingly, such meetings are now taking place virtually over computer networks through the use of application sharing technologies. Such technologies enable a sharing user to share an application with various viewing users. The display produced by the application running on the sharer's computer is made available via a computer network to the viewers' computers. In some cases, the sharer may pass control of the application to a viewer, whereby that viewer's control inputs are then communicated back to the sharer's computer, where the actions associated with the inputs are executed, and the resulting changed display is shared back out to all viewers.
Although application sharing has many clear benefits and can play a critical role in maintaining or increasing productivity and cooperation, current application sharing systems sometimes create a less than ideal user experience. For instance, the viewer display properties often are not optimized to suit the purposes of the sharer and viewer in sharing information. An example of this inefficiency appears in the way in which a particular window may be shared. Current systems generally display the shared window as it appears on the sharer's display, without accounting for the fact that only a subset of the window information is useful to the viewer. For example, when the viewer is not controlling a shared application, it is inefficient to display tool bars, menus and other application artifacts to the viewer who by definition cannot activate them at that time.
In addition, the display of such artifacts consumes valuable viewer area, wherein useful data could be displayed. Often, the shared window or information is scaled for presentation on the viewer display, so that the entire shared area fits within an application sharing window. In many cases, this requires that the shared display be scaled down to a lower resolution on the viewer's display than it has on the sharer's display. This reduction sometimes results in a document area that is difficult for the viewer to read or discern.
A new system and method are needed whereby sharing of window information during application sharing can be executed efficiently without unnecessarily impacting the quality of the viewer display.